The Team

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Keld Fosgerau
PhD, founder

Keld Fosgerau is a drug development professional with >25 years of international experience in leading companies, functions, departments and projects in virtual start-ups, established biotech, CROs, and in large integrated pharmaceutical organizations from novel target discovery to early clinical development. Keld Fosgerau delivered on 8 clinical candidates as a leader especially in the field of peptide therapeutics. Keld Fosgerau obtained has a MSc in chemistry (1995), a PhD in medicine from Copenhagen University (2000), and a bachelor MBA from Copenhagen Business School (2010). Keld previously held senior management positions as SVP of Research at Zealand Pharma, VP at Novo Nordisk, and CSO at Gubra and Keld Fosgerau has published more than 14 patent applications, 75 abstracts/proceedings, and 25 publications with more than 3000 citations. Keld founded Pephexia Therapeutics in 2020.

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Søren Ljungberg Pedersen
PhD, CTO & Head of Research

Søren Ljungberg Pedersen is a peptide drug hunter professional with >15 years of drug development experience from biotech as leader, peptide drug discovery specialist and pre-clinical discovery advisor. Søren Ljungberg Pedersen has profound experience from several successful international collaborations with large pharmaceutical companies. He obtained a MSc in Pharmaceutical Chemistry in 2005 and a PhD in Bioorganic chemistry in 2009. Following several Post-Doc positions, Søren held positions as Chemist at Novo Nordisk A/S and Senior Scientist, Group Leader Chemistry & IP, Group Leader Pharmaceutical Research at Gubra Aps. Søren Ljungberg Pedersen has published several patent applications, numerous abstracts and proceedings, a peptide synthesis book, and >30 scientific publications.

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Kamilla Rolsted
PhD, MBA, CBO

Kamilla Rolsted is a biotech professional with 20+ years of industry experience. Initially Kamilla Rolsted worked as scientist in academia and different pharma and biotech companies like LEO Pharma and Astion Pharma before moving to the business side, which has been the focus for the last 10 years. Kamilla Rolsted serves as advisor/consultant to start-ups and established biotech companies, is the co-founder of Isanans Pharma and has previously held executive positions in private and publicly traded companies like Zealand Pharma A/S and Bionor Pharma ASA. Kamilla Rolsted has been responsible for leading and defining corporate strategy and has led and participated in the negotiation of numerous agreements with pharmaceutical companies and academia. Kamilla Rolsted also has considerable experience in securing both equity-based financing and soft funding. Kamilla Rolsted is a certified pharmacist (2000), earned her PhD in bioanalysis/PK from University of Copenhagen (2008) and has an executive MBA from Copenhagen Business School (2015).

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Jenna E. Hunt
Research Scientist, PhD

Jenna Elizabeth Hunt is an in vivo Research Scientist in Pephexia with several years of experience from biotech and academia. She has profound experience in the execution of preclinical drug discovery studies and has been involved in several interdisciplinary projects especially in the area of metabolic research. Jenna holds a Ph.d. and a Master of Science from the University of Copenhagen and a B.Sc. from the University of Nottingham. She has published 13 peer-reviewed articles, including several first authorships.

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Camilla Lund
Research Scientist, PhD

Camilla Lund is an experienced in-vivo Research Scientist in Pephexia, specialized in the central regulation of body weight and metabolism. With a PhD in Basic Metabolic Research from the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research at the University of Copenhagen (awarded in 2023), Camilla has conducted numerous preclinical drug discovery studies and gained extensive expertise in her field. Camilla holds a M.Sc. and B.Sc. in pharmaceutical science from university of Copenhagen.

Board of Directors

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Dr. Anders Hinsby
PhD, chair

Anders Hinsby has more than 15 years of experience as a biotech entrepreneur, executive and investor. Currently, he is the CEO of Muna Therapeutics and works as entrepreneur-in-residence with Novo Seeds/Biorigin. He co-founded and was the CEO of Orphazyme A/S from 2009 to 2019 and led the company’s journey from University spin-out to a late-stage biopharmaceuticals company with a focus on rare diseases. In 2017 he led Orphazyme’s IPO on NASDAQ Copenhagen raising 90 MUSD. Prior to Orphazyme he was a Principal and later Partner in BankInvest Biomedical Venture, a Danish life-science dedicated venture capital fund. He currently serves on the Boards of Intomics A/S a Danish Biotech. Anders has a Ph.D. in Medicine from the University of Copenhagen.

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Keld Fosgerau
PhD, founder

Keld Fosgerau is a drug development professional with >25 years of international experience in leading companies, functions, departments and projects in virtual start-ups, established biotech, CROs, and in large integrated pharmaceutical organizations from novel target discovery to early clinical development. Keld Fosgerau delivered on 8 clinical candidates as a leader especially in the field of peptide therapeutics. Keld Fosgerau obtained has a MSc in chemistry (1995), a PhD in medicine from Copenhagen University (2000), and a bachelor MBA from Copenhagen Business School (2010). Keld previously held senior management positions as SVP of Research at Zealand Pharma, VP at Novo Nordisk, and CSO at Gubra and Keld Fosgerau has published more than 14 patent applications, 75 abstracts/proceedings, and 25 publications with more than 3000 citations. Keld founded Pephexia Therapeutics in 2020.

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Andrew Coats
Professor, MBA, DSc, DM

Andrew Coats has over 30 years of experience as an academic manager, having been both Dean of Medicine and Deputy Vice-Chancellor at the University of Sydney and head of Clinical Cardiology at Imperial College and the Royal Brompton Hospital in London. Andrew also served as CEO of the Norwich Research Park in the UK. Andrew is an experienced board director and chairman with an MBA from London Business School. He has over 20 years of experience of company boards in roles including audit, remuneration, nominations and governance committees in biotechnology, publishing health care and education, including the George Institute of International Health, the Woolcock Institute, Lone Star Heart, Myotec, PsiOxus, Radcliffe Group, ESN Cleer and Faraday (Australia). Andrew has been on the board of the Heart Failure Association (HFA) of the ESC since 2012 and will be its President from 2020 to 2022.  He has been a member of over 20 international clinical trial steering committees in the fields of heart failure and cachexia and has over 750 career research papers, 100,000 citations and an h-Index of 135. Andrew Coats is a co-founder of Actimed Therapeutics, having previously founded Myotec (later renamed PsiOxus Therapeutics).

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Mats Blom
CFO at Northsea Therapeutics

Mats Blom holds a position as CFO at North Sea Therapeutics in Amsterdam. Mats has extensive managerial experience and has held CFO positions in several public and non-public companies. He has served as CFO of Zealand Pharma A/B, a biotechnology company dual listed at Nasdaq in New York and Copenhagen and Swedish Orphan International, an orphan drug company acquired by BioVitrum in 2009. In addition, Mats has been CFO at Modus Therapeutics, Active Biotech AB and Anoto Group AB. He has also served as a management consultant at Gemini Consulting and Ernst & Young. Mats holds a BA in Business Administration and Economics from the University of Lund and an MBA from IESE University of Navarra, Barcelona. Mats is currently board member of Hansa Biopharma and Auris Medical.

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Stefan Anker
Professor, MD, PhD

Stefan Anker has 25 years academic research experience in heart failure, cachexia and clinical trials with positions in Imperial College in London as well as University Göttingen,and Charité Berlin. Stefan has been a tenured University-Professor in Germany since 2007, leading a highly active research group, and he is founding Editor-in-Chief of two successful scientific journals (including the Journal of Cachexia, Sarcopenia and Muscle). Stefan was Vice President of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) from 2016 to 2018, and served on the ESC board from 2012 to 2018. He is serving on the board of the Heart Failure Association (HFA) of the ESC since 2006; and was HFA President from 2012 to 2014. Stefan is the founding president of the International Society on Sarcopenia, Cachexia and Wasting Disorders, a position that he has held since 2008 (see www.cachexia.org). Stefan has been and is a member of over 30 international clinical trial steering committees and is currently chairing or co-chairing 6 trials in phase II/ III/IV. In this context, Stefan has significant experience interacting with regulators in different branches of the FDA and EMA. Stefan has over 900 research papers, 175,000 citations and a h-Index of 162 (Google Scholar). Stefan Anker is a co-founder of Actimed Therapeutics, having previously founded Myotec (later renamed PsiOxus Therapeutics).

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Bobby Soni (Board Observer)
PhD, CBO at BII

Bobby Soni is the Chief Business Officer of the BioInnovation Institute (BII) heading business development and the BII Venture Program. He has over 20 years of international experience in biotech (Maxygen), pharma BD (LEO Pharma), VC investor, (Novo Holdings and Imperial Innovations) and start-up acceleration (BII). Bobby is an American national and holds a PhD from the University of Virginia and B.Sc. in Biochemistry from the University of Rochester.

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Christian Anker-Ladefoged (Board Observer)
MSc, Finance, Venture Investor at EIFO (former Vækstfonden)

Christian is a venture investor at EIFO (Denmark’s Export and Investment Fund). He joined Pephexia as a board observer in 2023 and has over 5 years of experience with working in venture capital and investing in start-ups. Christian is part of the life science investment team at EIFO and is representing the fund at the boards of multiple life science start-ups. He is a Danish national and holds an MSc in finance from Copenhagen Business School.

Scientific Advisory Board

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Michael Mark
PhD, scientific advisor

Michael Mark was the Senior Vice President and Global Head of CardioMetabolic Diseases Research at Boehringer Ingelheim, Germany until his retirement end of 2019. In this role he was responsible for the research and development of innovative treatments for cardiovascular and metabolic diseases including type 2 diabetes mellitus, obesity, NASH and diabetic microvascular complications like eye diseases as well as kidney diseases. Educated as pharmacist Dr Mark is holding a Ph.D. degree in Pharmacology from the University of Tuebingen (Germany). Dr Mark has more than 30 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical industry. Early in his career Dr Mark contributed to the discovery and development of repaglinide (Novonorm®), an approved treatment of type 2 diabetes. He pioneered the discovery of the DPP-4 inhibitor linagliptin (Trajenta®) and was instrumental in the preclinical work for the SGLT2 inhibitor empagliflozin (Jardiance®), both compounds globally marketed. Together with his team he developed a competitive portfolio for cardiometabolic treatment options with various preclinical and several clinical development projects currently ongoing in all of the indications mentioned above. Dr Mark served as Project Coordinator for SUMMIT, an Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI)-sponsored European consortium of 19 academic centers and 6 major pharmaceutical partners, which aimed and succeeded to identify and characterize novel biomarkers and genetic markers for diabetic complications. Dr Mark authored many peer-reviewed publications and meeting contributions and also various book chapters. In addition he holds numerous patents. Currently Dr Mark is serving on the SAB of the DZD (German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD)) and is acting as a consultant to several pharmaceutical companies.

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Annette G. Beck-Sickinger
Prof. Dr., scientific advisor

Annette G. Beck-Sickinger is a professor of biochemistry and bioorganic chemistry at Leipzig University, Germany. Her major research fields include structure-activity relationships of peptide/protein hormones and G protein-coupled receptors. Tightly connected bioorganic synthesis, molecular biology tools, and cell biochemistry are applied to identify novel targets, novel therapeutic concepts and innovative approaches in obesity, epilepsy, cardiovascular diseases and biomaterials. She has been awarded many prizes including the Leonidas Zervas Award of the European Peptide Society (1998), the gold medal of the Max-Bergmann-Kreis (2009), the Albrecht Kossel Award of Biochemistry of the GDCh (2018) and the Du Vigneaud Award of the American Peptide Society (2019). She is a member of the National Academy of Science Leopoldina in Germany and was awarded with the Saxonian Order of Merit in 2017 and the European Chemistry Fellowship in 2019. Since 2020, she is head of the CRC “Structural dynamics of GPCR activation and signaling” funded by the German Science Foundation with 12 Mio €.

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Mikkel Bender
MSc, European patent attorney, scientific advisor

Mikkel Bender holds a Master’s degree in Molecular Biology (2003) and is a Certified Danish Patent Agent (2006) and a registered European Patent Attorney (2009). Mikkel Bender has 17 years of experience in private patent practice and is the founding partner at COPA Copenhagen Patents. Mikkel Bender is experienced in drafting and prosecuting patent applications before several patent authorities and jurisdictions especially within the fields of pharmaceuticals, diagnostics, microbiology and molecular biology. In addition, he has extensive experience in opposition and appeal proceedings before the EPO and before the Danish Board of Appeal for Patents and Trademarks as well as litigation proceedings. Mikkel Bender is a founding partner of CopaSeed (2018), which is a start-up supporting initiative formed by Partners at COPA Copenhagen Patents. CopaSeed focus on supporting and aiding start-up companies – especially within Biotech and Pharma – in the initial processes of idea/concept formation, IP generation/landscaping and business plan development. CopaSeed has several start-up companies in the portfolio, with which prosperous collaborations have emerged.

Advisors

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Charlotte Videbæk
MD, DMSc

Charlotte Videbæk supports Pephexia as Medical Advisor. She comes with a background as MD, DMSc and neurologist with a long experience both from the clinical-, pharmaceutical- & biotech world. Her pharmaceutical experience is broad from biomarker research, clinical research, portfolio strategy, project management and leadership. Today Charlotte is occupied as an entrepreneur, board member and consultant . The current focus in Pephexia is to secure a smart and robust development strategy for the companies’ key assets.

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Katarina J. Maiboe
PhD

Katarina Maiboe is a regulatory strategy expert and has more than 20 years of international experience with large and small-sized global pharma companies. Katarina holds a PhD in Pharmacology and a MSc in Pharmacy from the University of Copenhagen. She started her career in research but moved to regulatory affairs after a few years to focus on regulatory development and life cycle management strategies. Katarina has successfully led projects through regulatory interactions and new drug approvals from FDA, EMA, PMDA and other major agencies. Katarina was a.o. the global regulatory lead on Ozempic which she worked on from Phase 1 to launch in major markets. Katarina is currently VP of Regulatory at HMNC Brain Health, a privately held precision psychiatry company.

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Jens T. Bukrinski
PhD

Jens Bukrinski has more than 20 years of experience in drug development, 10 years in academia & formerly employed at Novozymes Biopharma and Novo Nordisk. With a total of 30+ drug development projects of which 8 drugs reached the market Jens has an acquired extensive knowledge in the areas of peptide and protein drug development within cancer, cardio vascular, metabolics, haemophilia, personalized medicines, vaccines & inflammation therapies. In 2016 Jens founded CMCA.

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Jonas Sørensen
MD

Jonas Sørensen supports Pephexia as Clinical Cancer Cachexia expert. He comes with a background as MD, board certified specialist in Clinical Oncology and Palliative Medicine, and has long clinical experience in patients with cancer. Besides that he brings valuable clinical insight and experience from other diagnosis groups. Jonas has focused his research within cancer cachexia, supportive care and symptom burden in patients with life-threatening diseases. Today Jonas is leading a comprehensive longitudinal research project at University of Copenhagen in patients with lung cancer.

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Lars J. Petersen, Professor
Clinical Advisor

Professor Lars J. Petersen supports Pephexia as a Clinical Development expert in oncology. He has more than 20 years of early-phase drug development expertise in biotech, pharma, and consulting. Lars is proprietary Director of ljpmedical Inc., Advisory Board Member of NDA Regulatory, and Senior Medical Advisor of KLIFO Drug Development Council. He comes with a background as MD, a Doctor of Medical Science degree in experimental immunology, and a Certificate in Business Administration from AVT Business School. Lars has a solid academic background as Clinical Professor (Chair) of cancer imaging at Aalborg University Hospital and more than 175 peer-reviewed publications.

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Jan K. Villadsen
Financial Advisor

Jan has been an executive finance professional for many years both as CFO in biotech companies – Gubra ApS. (privately held), NatImmune (Novo as controlling shareholder) and Neurokey (Novo as controlling shareholder) – and as Treasurer in a global company (Group 4 Falck A/S). In addition, he has held several senior positions in the financial sector primarily in investment banking and capital markets operations. He has two Graduate Diplomas in Business Administration from CBS. One in International Business and one in Organisation and Management.

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Kristopher Brown
Corporate attorney, advisor

Kristopher Brown is a partner in the Life Sciences and Technology group at Goodwin Procter LLP. Kris focuses his practice on capital markets, M&A, collaboration and licensing arrangements, private equity and venture capital financing transactions. He represents numerous financial and corporate strategic investors as well as many established and emerging growth companies in the life sciences, technology and healthtech sectors. Kris is also an active global angel investor and has been among the first investors in over 50 startups.

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Dr. Kristian Strømgaard (advisor)
Professor, PhD, advisor

Kristian Strømgaard obtained an MSc degree in Chemical Research from University College London, a PhD degree in medicinal chemistry (1999) and subsequently did a post doc at Columbia University. In 2006, he was appointed full professor at the age of 36. In 2012, he co-founded Avilex Pharma, and brought the lead compound into clinical development. In 2014, he was appointed Director of Center for Biopharmaceuticals, a research center on peptide and protein engineering. Recently, he spent a year as visiting professor at Harvard Medical School. Kristian Strømgaard is the co-founder of Avilex Pharma (2012), a spinout company exploring protein-protein interactions as novel disease targets. Winner of ‘The Copenhagen Spin-out Award for most promising company’, 2013. Obtained >DKK 55 mio. in funds from Novo Seeds, Grand Solutions, Wellcome Trust, Growth Fund DK and Innobooster.

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Per Toftager
Communication expert, advisor

Per Toftager is a highly skilled and experienced art director and copywriter who has been working in communication and campaigns for over 20 years. He has collaborated with a diverse range of both private and public clients across various sectors, including food, industry, government, and politics. With extensive experience in national election campaigns for the Danish Parliament, he has worked with parties such as Venstre (The Liberal Party of Denmark), Socialdemokratiet (Social Democratic Party), and SF (Socialist People’s Party). Additionally, he has executed international campaigns for EU groups. Per is also well-versed in advertising food and beverage products, having worked with a wide array of clients and products in the food industry.